Posted
by
Soulskill
on Friday May 09, 2014 @01:27PM
from the failure-to-launch dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Two weeks ago, SpaceX filed suit against the U.S. Air Force in an attempt to enforce competition for rocket purchases. They argued it was a bad idea to blindly shovel money into Russia's coffers for rides to space, and said there was no way for other rocket manufacturers to get a foot in the door. Last week, it looked like they were getting traction — an injunction was granted, temporarily halting the Air Force's process of buying rockets. Unfortunately for SpaceX, that injunction has now been dissolved. At the heart of the suit was Executive Order 13,661, which blocks the transfer of wealth to people in the Russian Federation who are related to the situation in the Ukraine. SpaceX said that since Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin was the head of their space agency, payments to the agency were effectively payments to him. The U.S. departments of Commerce, State, and the Treasury all sent letters to the court saying this was not the case, and the court agreed. Here's the final ruling."

I don't think Elon expected to win that easy, but look how much publicity he got for filing a simple claim and getting a temporary injunction. He got to say a few times how they are 4x cheaper than the old guys, that might be remembered by some press and politicians the next time there is a big contract up for grabs.

Conspicuous legal procedures and political gymnastics are part of the Corporate/Government - Lobby/Courts Eco-system. SpaceX must exercise their ability to influence courts' legal authority to be immediately responsive to their trade concerns. My point is that the injunction or its dissolution is not important, but the speed in which they accessed court authority is meaningful.

When SpaceX lawyers make a legal assertion the US Court System prioritizes their concerns and responds immediately. Meanwhile, all other stuff on the court dockets languish in obscurity and red tape. If SpaceX has the legal/political clout to effect immediate response from the courts, then that is what I find most noteworthy. Whether or not their injunction is upheld is less important than their ability to get the government's (and our) undivided attention on the issue of their concerns. Its nice to have corporate clout, since corporations are now people. DemocracyX at work.

That's not really the courts' decision to make, though. Congress authorized the President to freeze transfers to certain individuals. The President designated some of them here. Therefore the law prohibits transferring money to these specific individuals. It does not ban transferring money to the government of Russia, only to some of its specific politicians, in their individual capacity.

Now it's possible that Russia is so corrupt that there's no meaningful difference between Putin's money and the government's money. But if Congress and/or the President believe that and want to prohibit the transfer of money to Russia as a whole, not only to certain Russian individuals, they need to make that decision and enact that law.